


Faulty Hearts

by Inaccessible Rail (strangetales)



Series: The K.J. Poetry Series [2]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Bisexual Henry Mills, F/M, Gen, Introspective Nonsense, Poetry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-30
Updated: 2016-08-30
Packaged: 2018-08-11 23:20:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7911511
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/strangetales/pseuds/Inaccessible%20Rail
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Henry starts leaving some rather maudlin literature around the house. And the diner, and the Jolly. And Regina's vault, of course, rolled up scrolls of heartbreak shoved into empty drawers that once contained actual hearts and even he had to admit, that was a bit on the dramatic side.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Faulty Hearts

**Author's Note:**

> Unlike the previous drabble, this poem does not exclusively appear in chronological order within the story. If you would like to read the whole thing (in its proper order), I’ve got it on [my Tumblr](http://starlessness.tumblr.com/post/146282705567/a-pair-of-ragged-claws-it-is-a-constant), or you can look it up: “The Woman Who Could Not Live With Her Faulty Heart,” by Margaret Atwood. This is a bit shorter than my previous, and it ended up being way more Captain Cobra heavy than I expected. Next one will have more Emma, I promise.

Henry and Violet breakup in a startlingly loud whirlwind of teenage angst. It is late summer, and Killian Jones hates air conditioning. Emma can't sleep without it. Apparently, when you're making a bloody _person_ , your body temperature has a tendency to rise, unreasonably so. As such, he begrudgingly tolerates the thing, though not without the occasional aside. Emma will argue that it's anything but "occasional," and he should save the speeches for the next disaster. 

“And if it bothers you so much,” she urges, “then go sleep on your ship for the summer.” He is secretly enamored that she can refer to her as a "ship" and not a boat, even in the throes of hormone-induced anger. He tries to ignore the wetness gathering at the corners of her eyes as he turns to leave, the painful thudding of his own heart.

They last about 4 hours before he feels her slip beneath the lightweight sheet on the bunk in his cabin, sweat and all. He apologizes even though she says there’s no need. It’s just that he can’t stand the artificiality of it all. It’s summer, he should be hot. However much he despised Neverland, it wasn’t the humidity he couldn’t stand. There’s something comforting about it; the persistent damp.

"I never liked it either," she whispers against the sticky skin of his chest. But he understands. He'll weather it for her. And her. Emma had always preferred opening windows to the electric alternative, something about freedom, and the breeze that stays slightly warm, even at night. His heart quiets.

**“It is a constant pestering**  
**in my ears, a caught moth, limping drum,**  
**a child’s fist beating**    
**itself against the bedsprings:**  
**I want, I don’t want.**  
**How can one live with such a heart?”**

The thing about teenage angst is that for however much you want to laugh and remind those young lovers how inconsequential it will all seem later, how there's more than one fish in the sea (rubbish expression, if you were to ask him), it still hurts. It hurts because it reminds you. It hurts because you can't stand to see it hurt them. You laugh because it hurts and you'd rather not remember.

Henry starts leaving some rather maudlin literature around the house. And the diner, and the Jolly. And Regina's vault, of course, rolled up scrolls of heartbreak shoved into empty drawers that once contained actual hearts and even he had to admit, that was a bit on the dramatic side.

It's different, the poetry, from what he's used to. Far more antiquated language in the older stuff; sweeping landscapes, tropes of a time dead and gone in this world (yet strangely familiar in his own). Emma tries to talk about modernism and post-modernism but he's not sure it matters. He thinks he likes it though. He likes that it asks, refuses to err. It demands far more than the usual, and it makes him distinctly uncomfortable.

**“Long ago I gave up singing  
to it, it will never be satisfied or lulled.”**

Watching Henry's torment, he cannot help but remember a time before the naval uniform, before Liam's divine intervention. And he tries to relate, but it's hard for Henry to know; Killian's heart has been still for so long now that he's not sure Henry really remembers him before his romance with Emma began. But it had been a fickle thing, tugged in too many directions, an uncomfortable beat in his chest that he would sooner be rid of than to stand it for one moment longer.

**“I want, I don’t want.”**

When he holds his daughter in his arms for the first time, he can feel the tug again. The “caught moth,” the “limping drum.” And he hates that he can't just be still in this moment, this silent cabin aboard his ship; there's nowhere else he would rather be but her heart is going to _want_. He is going to want to be perfect for her, and he's not, and Emma is not, but his daughter, this nameless heart made of flesh and bone, with his eyes and Emma's chin and he just needs to be perfect. He thinks of Henry with the rumpled sheets and the loud, angry music, and the red-rimmed eyes and he just prays that her heart will be steadier than his own.

"But she was born at sea," Emma explains softly. The candlelight is dwindling, the wood gently creaking with every brush of the waves against her sides. "She'll never be still."

The first time he was born, it was on land; in an inn somewhere, with his father gone and a midwife whose name he had never learned. The second time he was born, it was at sea, and his father was still gone, but he had a brother, and the sounds of the ocean and a salty wind whistling through the sails, and the loud screeching of hungry birds. Oh, how his heart had beat then.

**“How can one live with such a heart?”**

…

“Alright, lad?”

It is autumn, and the air conditioner has been relocated to a box in the basement somewhere. He has left Emma in their bed, their daughter asleep against her chest. Her impossibly tiny feet and hands twitch every so often, even in sleep, and Emma is gracious enough to refrain from saying “I told you so.” He was sure to keep the window open, to let in a cool, early morning breeze that smells suspiciously of winter and wood smoke.

He had been intent upon fixing her a mug of hot chocolate, but he had glanced out the window above the sink and seen the top of Henry’s head, the band from those large headphones resting against his hair (that has gotten a bit too long).

Henry moves them back against his neck when he notices Killian approach, and he offers a soft, conciliatory smile.

“Yeah, fine,” he answers, unknowingly accepting what should have been his mother’s hot chocolate, “thanks.”

Killian had tried the relating bit before, and it hadn’t gone so well the first few times, so he takes a different tack; methodical, inquisitive. He pulls a wrinkled piece of paper from his pocket.

“What about this one, then?”

Henry gives a cursory glance, “What about it?”

“No historical significance? No remark about it being their ‘best work?’”

Henry had always been especially studious concerning Killian’s literary interests, always careful to keep his own feelings out of it, said he didn’t want to somehow encourage, or discourage, Killian’s own reaction. “It’s about guts,” he had told him once, “You’ll just _feel_ it.”

“No,” he answered, taking a small sip of his drink, “no criticism this time.”

“May I?” Killian asks. They can hear soft music playing from the kitchen, and they know Emma’s awake. Henry shrugs.

He wants to tell him about his heart, so he does. He tells him that he was born twice, and both times he was alone and his heart had beat like the moth caught in a trap. And he told him that no matter how many times he had begged it to still, it wouldn’t. When he had met Milah it had paused, for a time, but every once in a while it would start again and he would ignore it; and he would keep ignoring it for over 300 years before Henry’s mother would pull him free from beneath a pile of corpses and he can’t help but think there’s something poetic about _that_.

“And now?” Henry asks, his expression pensive, and cheeks red from the cold. “How does it feel now?”

“It’s quiet,” he replies, hoping that the smile he offers is one of comfort, “but it won’t always be.” He offers his advice subtly, but pointedly, a warning, a general reminder. It won’t always be this bad, he means to say, but it can’t always be good either.

Henry nods his head, and they hear Emma calling from the window, something about pancakes and fussing babies and Killian makes to leave before Henry gently grabs his wrist and gives it the barest hint of a squeeze. A soft pulsing, and Killian’s heart thumps, but it’s pleasant. He’ll gladly allow the thing to beat for Henry, for Emma and their daughter.

“Thanks, Killian.”

…

One day soon after, Henry Mills meets Captain Nemo's son, and the words he leaves behind make all of their hearts lighter.

**“One night I will say to it:**  
**Heart, be still,**  
**and it will.”**

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah, so, I made Henry Mills bi and it is now an undeniable fact. Whoops. Hoping to return to it in later works!


End file.
